Sunday, September 5, 2010

The History of Coprolites


We             f
                   a
                   l
                   l

and crash onto
the abyssal plain, and be come calcareous marl
                        the brackish sediment all around us on the edge
                                                of the shelf, in the middle of the rise

to be buried in turbidity
           

we are patient.

and wait.

we are
            subducted
and added,
                        an accretion.
compressed conglomerate

we wait.

time has no end
                                    no beginning
                        no purpose

and then in molten ballet
            we dance
                        two
                                    three
            one foot to the

left
                        another to the right

PressureBuildsAndInOne

full of awe

moment

we are                                     air
                                    and we
                                                            Fly.

2 comments:

  1. I was wondering what your intended audience is when you're writing. It seems that you get a great deal of pleasue writing for yourself- since you studied geology and this poem is entitled coprolites- but the average person doesn't know what they are.

    I also wonder if not knowing the definition of the word affects the enjoyment of the reader when going through this poem. I really enjoyed reading it and by the end of the poem I had to admit I didn't know what coprolites were. I finally had a good friend clue me in.

    I just find poetry comprehension levels interesting. Despite not knowing the meaning of the title I was still able to enjoy the visual placement of the words and the almost story-like flow of your diction. Very clever. Keep writing. I'd like to see more poetry on this blog.

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  2. I…don’t really have much of an intended audience. What I mean by that is I never write for or to any group in particular. I suppose my audience ends up being people similar to me. My goal when writing this was to turn something we view as the lowest of the low, and then turn it into something else, something more.

    I also tried to write the poem so that you don’t HAVE to know what coprolites are in order to enjoy the poem. When you know what they are, it makes it a little better, but it winds up being something more along the lines of an inside joke than something you need to know to understand the poem.

    Glad to see you like the poem though, it’s always good to hear. More poetry will be coming. Eventually. I tend to write a lot of stuff I don’t like and put it away until I can figure out what I don’t like and how to fix it.

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